Author Description

The annual Global Employment Trends reports provide the latest global and regional estimates of employment and unemployment, employment by sector, vulnerable employment, labor productivity, and working poverty, while also analyzing country-level issues and trends in the labor market. The 2013 edition highlights how the worldwide economic crisis is increasingly raising trend unemployment rates, partly driven by sectoral shifts of jobs that had been triggered by the crisis. The report argues that in countries with high and rising unemployment, job guarantee programs for targeted labor market groups should be a policy priority. Moreover, rising labor market discouragement and structural unemployment should be tackled with new skills and training initiatives to help jobseekers find employment in alternative industries and to promote their employability more broadly. Other possible areas of intervention are further investments in public infrastructure in developing countries and a swift implementation of financial market regulation to help stabilize the macroeconomic environment and stimulate job creation.